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Striving for Military and Economic Security

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Book cover Geopolitics, Development, and National Security

Part of the book series: SpringerBriefs in Political Science ((BRIEFSPOLITICAL))

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Abstract

The below paper contrasts the Ancient Near East’s two main religious forms, Mesopotamian polytheism and Biblical (chiefly Old Testament) monotheism, with regard to how the average worshipers related to their respective religion as akin to a mechanism ensuring sacred personal security, in a world that equated weather, warfare, sex and social life with invoking the most competent god. Worshiping such deities as Ba’al or Inanna was a relatively “low-maintenance” cultic experience, of public and material character manifested via festivals, sacrifices, and rituals including sexual sympathetic magic, to curry the favor of entities depicted as both awe-inspiring and possessed of very human flaws and urges. Doing so likely granted worshipers a sense of “being in control” by having “manipulated” or at least placated their deity with offerings so that it may, in return (do ut des), “guarantee” them their status quo by economic and military security, i.e. protection from the elements and from war. On the other hand, the “jealous” God of Israel demanded a much more personal and internalized (“from the heart”) relationship not unlike that of a betrothal, whose more intense involvement was seen to yield genuine personal security on all levels.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The following article incorporates arguments and passages from the following of my former works: A. Botica (2012), pp. 67–93; A. Botica, “The Social, Cultural and Religious Context of Making ‘Love Music’ in Biblical Israel,” 3–5, Ars Sacra International Conference, Emanuel University of Oradea, December 12–17, 2013 (unpublished draft), and A. Botica, “Weather, Agriculture and Religion in the Ancient Near East and the Old Testament,” Perichoresis vol. 11/1 (June 2013), pp. 97–124.

  2. 2.

    Thus A. Botica, “The Theophoric Element Ba’al in Ancient Phoenician Inscriptions,” Perichoresis vol. 10/1 (Jan 2012), pp. 67–93.

  3. 3.

    Thus Smith (1994, 2009, 2002), 28 ff.; Liverani, “Phoenicia,” ISBE, 3:860, who argued that Phoenician religion was a “direct continuation of 'Canaanite’ religion of the Late Bronze Age (known especially from the Ugaritic texts).”

  4. 4.

    As a divine name, “Ba’al appeared in sources earlier than the Ugaritic texts or inscriptions.” Thus de Moor, “Ba’al,” Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament (TDNT), G.J. Botterweck ed. (1988), 2:187, for references to sources from the Old Babylonian period.

  5. 5.

    We have shown that Liverani, “Phoenicia,” ISBE, 3:861 lists, among the other deities that Phoenicians worshipped, Melqart (with the other names of Eshmun and Adonis), Resheph, Dagon, and Elyon, that were “within certain limits amenable to the fundamental elements of the triad.” Note also Schmitz, “Phoenician Religion,” 5:362, and Zevit, The Religions of Ancient Israel, 608 ff. for the phenomenon of “paired deities” like Elyon and Ba’alat (at Byblos), Astarte and Melqart (at Tyre), Ba’al Hammon and Tinnit (fifth-century Carthage), and evidently the pair Ba’al-Astarte.

  6. 6.

    Gray, “Canaan, Religion of,” ABD, 1:831.

  7. 7.

    Van der Toorn (2003), pp. 393–410.

  8. 8.

    For the theory of the “dying and rising god” see Smith (2001), 104 ff.. See also de Moor, “Ba’al,” TDOT, 2:185, for the motif of the “dying and raising god” in Phoenician religion, and Schmitz, “Phoenician Religion,” ABD, 5:359.

  9. 9.

    A. Botica, “The Theophoric Element Ba’al in Ancient Phoenician Inscriptions,” Perichoresis vol. 10/1 (Jan 2012), pp. 67–93.

  10. 10.

    Ibid., and also Morenz (1992), pp. 162–63. Note also Walton (1990), 24 ff., with an analysis of cosmogonies from ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Sumer and (later) Akkad and Canaan. See also Zevit, The Religions of Ancient Israel, p. 649, for the fact “that archaeological data shows that pair-deities are attested even in the worship of ancient Israelites.” We noted the fact that the Bible itself recognizes this practice, especially in the period of the Judges and the Monarchy (e.g., Judg 6:25, with reference to “altar of Ba’al and the Asherah [pole] in Gideon’s family).

  11. 11.

    Thus de Moor, “ba’al,” TDOT, 2:185–186. Thus Muller, “štrt,” TDOT, 11:426, points out that in the myth of Baal, “Astarte takes a back seat to Anat, Baal’s ‘sister.’”

  12. 12.

    Thus Smith, The Ugaritic Ba’al Cycle, 117 ff. and de Moor, “ba’al,” TDOT, 2:191–92.

  13. 13.

    Keel and Uehlinger (1998), pp. 27–28, 54, 66–67. For the representation of the “erotic” goddesses in Sumerian and Babylonian “temple art,” see also F. Pinnock (1997), 2:2521.

  14. 14.

    A. Botica, “The Theophoric Element Ba’al in Ancient Phoenician Inscriptions,” Perichoresis vol. 10/1 (Jan 2012), pp. 67–93.

  15. 15.

    Van de Moor, “Ba’al,” TDOT, 2:188 ff.

  16. 16.

    A. Botica, “The Theophoric Element Ba’al in Ancient Phoenician Inscriptions,” and “Ba’al,” The Dictionary of Demons and Deities in the Bible, Karel van der Toorn ed. (1995), 132 ff.

  17. 17.

    A. Botica, “The Theophoric Element Ba’al in Ancient Phoenician Inscriptions,” Perichoresis vol. 10/1 (Jan 2012), 67–93, with references to Kramer (1963,1969), esp. 67 ff.

  18. 18.

    For the function of Inanna as a war goddess see “Ishtar,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, K. van der Toorn ed. (1999), pp. 452–456.

  19. 19.

    See Sefati, Y. (1998), 208 ff. For a review on scholarship and the history of the concept of Sacred Marriage see Johanna Stuckey, “Inanna and the ‘Sacred Marriage,” http://www.matrifocus.com/IMB05/spotlight.htm, and http://www.matrifocus.com/SAM05/spotlight.htm

  20. 20.

    Y. Sefati, Y. (1998), 208 ff.

  21. 21.

    O. Keel, The Symbolism of the Biblical World, p. 285.

  22. 22.

    Frymer-Kensky (1992), 50 ff.

  23. 23.

    Thus Brooks (1941):227–253; Erlandsson S, “znh,” TDOT, 4:99–104; Andersen and Freedman (1980), pp. 369–70; Jung, “Ba’al,” ISBE, 1:377–79; Stuart (1987), pp. 83–84; Stuckey (2005), 38 ff.

  24. 24.

    Note Tigay J. (1996), p. 481; Frymer-Kensky, In the Wake of the Goddesses, 50 ff.; Barstad (1984), esp. 26 ff.; Marsman (2003), p. 497; Wyatt, “Astarte,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, p. 113;

  25. 25.

    Miller, The Religion of Israel, p. 206. We noted that for Miller the notion of “playing the whore” was a metaphor for “idolatry.” Thus Jer 3:6:"Have you seen what she did, that faithless one, Israel, how she went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and there played the whore?”

  26. 26.

    Phyllis Bird (1989), pp. 75–94.

  27. 27.

    Deuteronomy 21:10–34:12, pp. 549–551.

  28. 28.

    A. Botica, “The Social, cultural and religious context of making ‘love music’ in Biblical Israel,” 3–5, Ars Sacra International Conference, Emanuel University of Oradea, December 12–17, 2013 (unpublished draft).

  29. 29.

    A. Botica, “The Theophoric Element Ba’al in Ancient Phoenician Inscriptions,” Perichoresis vol. 10/1 (Jan 2012), pp. 67–93. In this context, we have also referred to Morenz (1992), pp. 162–63; von Soden (1985), 212 ff.; J. Walton (1990), 24 ff.; Zevit (2001), p. 649; M. Smith (1994, 2009), 117 ff.; F. Pinnock (1995), 2:2521–2531.

  30. 30.

    A. Botica, “The Social, cultural and religious context of making ‘love music’ in Biblical Israel,” 5. We also noted the sexual exploits of gods in the Egyptian “Ennead”, in L. Manniche (2013), 29 ff., or the pornographic description of the Sumerian god Enki, in J.G. Westenholz, “Love Lyrics from the Ancient Near East,” 2474.

  31. 31.

    T. Frymer-Kensky, In the Wake of the Goddess, pp. 47–48.

  32. 32.

    Note especially, O. Keel and C. Uehlinger (1998), pp. 26–41; O. Keel, The Symbolism of the Biblical World: Ancient Near Eastern Iconography and the Book of Psalms, 345; F. Pinnock (1995), 2:2520–2531; J.S. Cooper (1997), pp. 85–97.

  33. 33.

    “Ishtar,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, p. 453.

  34. 34.

    In this sense, see G.S. Holland (2009), 117 ff., for the Mesopotamian god Ninurta, who was both a “war and a weather” deity. Ba’al may not have been considered a god of war in the proper sense, but was venerated as such. Various inscriptions depict Ba’al armed with a spear and sword, symbols of warfare. Thus F. Andersen and D.N. Freedman (1980), p. 223, and A. Bertholet (2004), p. 106, for Ba’al in Egypt as a god of war. The same phenomenon happened in the case of Mars, the Roman god of war, who in the beginning had been venerated as a “fertility” god. Thus Mary Beard ed. (1998), 55 ff., for the widespread worship of Mars in far Roman provinces, and J. Rupke (2007), pp. 107–109, for Mars controlling the domains of war and agriculture. In fact, the month of March, that bears the name of the god, was considered the month when both farming and war began.

  35. 35.

    For the issue of Ba’al worship in Israel see F. Andersen and D.N. Freedman (1980), esp. pp. 243–58, and D. Stuart (1987), pp. 57–62.

  36. 36.

    Thus J.E. Harrison (2010), pp. 134–35, and A. Lang (2005), 59 ff.

  37. 37.

    D. Migliore (2008), p. 28.

  38. 38.

    H.D. Preuss (1966), 167 ff.

  39. 39.

    W. Eichrodt (2003), pp. 232–39.

  40. 40.

    Ibid., p. 237.

  41. 41.

    Thus F. Andersen and D.N. Freedman, Hosea, p. 284.

  42. 42.

    D. Stuart, Hosea-Jonah, p. 62.

  43. 43.

    See Preuss, Old Testament Theology, vol. 1, 105 ff., and W. Schmidt (1999), pp. 347–49.

  44. 44.

    P. King (1988), 80 ff.

  45. 45.

    This is a wider theme in the Old Testament, implied in the Book of Judges, where idolatry on the part of Israel caused God to unleash the foreign enemies upon her. In fact, the Old Testament authors understand most military calamities in her history (the exiles of 722 B.C.E and 596 B.C.E) as a punishment for idolatrous worship.

  46. 46.

    D.K. Stuart (2006), pp. 450–54.

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  1. Emanuel University of Oradea, Oradea, Romania

    Aurelian Botica Dr.

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  1. Emanuel University of Oradea Faculty of Management, Oradea, Romania

    Sebastian Vaduva

  2. Marketing & International Business, University of Akron, Broadview Heights, Ohio, USA

    Andrew R. Thomas

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Botica, A. (2015). Striving for Military and Economic Security. In: Vaduva, S., Thomas, A. (eds) Geopolitics, Development, and National Security. SpringerBriefs in Political Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-12685-2_6

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